Storm Chasers

We check the weather more than anyone I know these days. We are more cautious of high winds, torrential down pours, and overnight freezes than we have ever been. In a house you don't have to think twice of these things- in Destiny it all matters immensely, The rainy nights are no longer a peaceful pitter-patter on the roof as you doze into a sweet slumber.... it brings anxiety, worry and anger. No matter how many tubes of silicone we lather there is still a leak somewhere. We have figured out a few tricks to stop most of them but when it really comes down- we are helpless!

It's Monday night and it looks like a huge storm is about to hit the whole Mid-west. It is time to say goodbye to Nashville and make a run for Brett's. We drove up to Benton, IL to stay at a Walmart and get on the road. It was about 1am by the time we pulled up and we almost ran out of gas. Turns out that in small towns nobody stays open late, not even gas stations! Thank you Lord for letting us find one that was open right as we were coming up on "E"!

I woke up at 7am to start the next 8 hour stretch of driving. The wind was bad- like blow you into a  whole other lane bad. Turns out there are tornado watches right where we were driving. After passing through St. Louis Jordan took the wheel and that's when all hell broke loose. The sky was dark, the winds were crazy and it just started pouring. The horizon was looking worse and worse and the Doppler images weren't promising. But we had no choice to put the pedal to the metal and hope the tornado watches were lies. At one point there were a couple of extremely dark clouds almost touching down right next to us. We were pretty sure it was going to form a tornado in a matter of minutes! (I know we are dramatic city kids). We pushed on the long drive... well it felt long because we were stressing over the weather and maybe because I might have put the wrong address into the GPS which took us on a 50 mile detour (at most, not the 200 miles the boys were trying to accuse me of!!!!) So yes, with two city kids running from a mid west storm we were so glad to make it safe and sound and all in one piece.

This was taken in the afternoon, the clouds were so eerie

Not always reassuring....

This is just one of the storms we had to cross through,
we were in the red part most of the time!

Brett, Chelsea, and Callie took us out to dinner at a local diner and we all got acquainted. Jordan and Brett have grown up together in Lake Arrowhead, but I had only seen him in passing a few times. Chelsea is a few years younger than I am but we both spent some years in Arrowhead so it was fun to try and see if we knew any of the same people. We are off to bed now- in a warm, water proof home with running water, thanks to Brett! Jordan starts work at the Napa store tomorrow, wish him luck!